


Brink

by midnightzengarden



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age - Various Authors, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Backstory, Canon Het Relationship, Character Development, Character Study, Eventual Fluff, F/M, Fade Sex, Fade Tongue, First Time, Future Fic, Headcanon, Kink Meme, Missing Scene, Myth Arc, Non-Graphic Smut, Original dialogue, Post-Canon, Resolved Sexual Tension, Romance, Smut, Spoilers, original events, twist ending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-15
Updated: 2015-05-05
Packaged: 2018-03-13 03:30:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 12,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3366086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightzengarden/pseuds/midnightzengarden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The well of sorrows whispers to Lavellan granting secrets that always seem to lie just slightly out of reach. Only Solas can give her the answers that she seeks, and the only thing she wants more than answers is him.  Original dialogue (though I have borrowed and bastardized from bits and pieces, here and there.) Original events/ not a drawn out retelling of the game. A couple of chapters will be rated M and they will be clearly marked.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> What little elvhen I use is comprised of words taken graciously from the DA Elven Language Wiki. Also, and I think most obviously, much of Solas' past and current motivations are up for major debate and there are several interpretations. This is just my head canon. There will be eventual smut. I would like to say it will all be tasteful and classy, but that depends on them. I just work here. Love me, hate me, critique me. I have a lot of unfinished business I need to resolve with these two. If you're reading this then there is a good chance that you do t0o. Maybe after all of this we can both finally get a little bit of peace.

_Prologue_

Cole dipped the brim of his hat against the full press of the rising sun, and stood quietly as she passed. He had been nothing if not an unlikely companion, but as she had set out to attend to this task on her own he had come to her as if summoned, his lithe form manifesting and then seeming to fade again as they cut a small path towards an island lake tower forever in the distance. He had already proven himself to be the perfect ally, his uncanny form standing over her small prone one as she paused periodically along their trek to pierce the veil and cautiously enter the fade. Though he had asked nothing of her wanderings there, nor questioned even her most basic intent, she had chosen to take comfort in his pressence and had hoped it meant that he understood her course of actions. If he did not, then perhaps he was atleast there to ensure she survived the futile task she had happlessly labored upon herself. It seemed that only time would tell, as he did not seem overly eager to share.

"Do you feel it, here?" he asked, mutedly. His voice was a melodic monotone she would never be able to explain to anyone who had not yet heard him speak. "The wolf..." he whispered," The wolf would bite but Pride would lick your hand."

She piqued her ears and suddenly became more acutely aware of the absolute silence surrounding them. Turning to scan the nearby tree line, she found nothing and cocked her head back towards him, his face pale and unreadable as she fully regarded what would appear to most as an ill placed guardian scarecrow.

"Is the tower near, Cole? Are we close?" He was nothing if not a man of riddles, and he merely gestured in response. "Well, I guess I'm still following you, then."

As they continued to move the sun progressed slowly against a darkening sky, the trees becoming more sparse as it set behind them, the light of a new moon revealing at long last the shore of a dark glassy lake.

"Battlements..." Cole announced, pointing to the crest of a small tower that stood as the lone structure on a small eroding island, "she cried herself to sleep on cold stone but his blood had sealed the door. Death magic."

"Yes, I feel it, too. Let's set up camp. I want to see what's on the other side."

The map Fairbanks had given her had depicted several surviving Dalish ruins scattered sparsely throughout the lush expanse of the Emerald Graves. She had been traveling pointedly between them all, but none of them had stricken her quite like this. The veil was almost nonexistent, here. Here, energy from the fade whispered against your skin and spoke luridly against your ear. It not only welcomed her, it wanted her. Just the pure thought of entering there made the anchor within her right hand pulse expectantly.

Flexing her fingers to dispel the gathering energy, Cole crouched silently beside her and began tending what she hoped would soon become a small fire. It would be a welcome accomplishment indeed with the thick damp moving to surround them deep within the basin. She was thankful he was so resourceful.

"Found..." He stood abruptly and instantly braced her by the shoulders, catching her offguard as he stared at her intently for a moment."Waiting. Going, but waiting. So much sadness."

"Cole, is it Solas? Is Solas the one that's been found?"

"Yes,"his face became marked with visible pain, his eyes closing as if he needed a moment to gather himself, "but he does not want to see. You called to him in whispers, tears in a dream. Lips. Skin. Fingers trailing through dust. Rivers through ruins."

She rested her hand upon his and squeezed it slightly. It was true she had become very fond of the spirit despite his otherworldly circumstances, but his sensitivity to the emotions of those around him had almost rendered him a complete cypher. No matter what she encountered with Solas when she finally crossed to meet him in the mists, there was a great possibility that Cole would be able to feel the brunt of it. Despite his willingness to help, or his almost desperate need to do so, she felt an overwhelming demand to do this alone. She would not be a source of misery for this creature. Solas' parting had already left him a slightly more enigmatic man than he had been before, his words comforting her in the necessity of his absence almost at the same time as he urged her in pleading tones to go to him. Whatever transpired now she wished to endure it at her own pace. She knew what she must do.

"Cole," she said gently, " If I asked for you to go, if I asked you not to come back for me, would you understand?"

He blinked slowly, but nodded after a fashion. She had come to realize recently that the only reason he ever blinked at all was because he found it to be polite. Otherwise, he was often prone to long silent boughts of staring that many had found to be disturbing. She had made a mental note to teach him to smile, next. His pallid forlorn expression often gave him the look of a stricken young man not long for the world. Which perhaps, in a way, was accurate enough.

"You want me to go to someone I can help," he said," but I did help. Here, spirits can dream, too. Solas likes spirits and he likes the fade. He asked for me to protect you."

"Protect me? Why?"

"He said that others would not like it. "

"Others? Like Leliana and Cassandra?"

"The others leave the past, but the past haunts and screams and beckons." He faded as he spoke, reappearing behind her as she turned towards the direction of his voice. "He almost lost the mask. The water sings to you. He asked you not to drink. He was not ready to say the words."

As though waiting for his queue, a vast den of voices,now forever whispering in the far recesses of her mind, began to rise in their cacophony, deafening in their numbers. The servants of Mythal were now in full attendance. As their long elvhen syllables lilted and swarmed, it all sounded ancient and alien and growingly familiar. One phrase was being repeated in a slow succession just outside of her comprehension."Asha dar lath el, Fen'harel."

"What words, Cole? What couldn't he tell me?"

His slim form faded once more until only his voice remained. Whatever it was he meant to say he chose not face her directly as he did it. "He wanted you to know his name."

"His name? His name is, Solas."

"Solas is his pride. His name is a curse."

She circled, seeking him in the dark though he chose to remain hidden. "I don't understand, you're not making any sense. Who is he, Cole? Tell me his name."

Though she could now only sense him in the barest terms, she felt his hand lie upon the top of her head as though he were about to comfort a small lonely child. And as he whispered the name against her ear, the voices that had almost drowned out everything else now suddenly left her stunned with their utter silence.

"Asha dar lath el, Fen'harel," Cole said, and the phrase finally took shape and formed into the words the servants of Mythal had been urgently willing her to hear.

"This woman tends to, Fen'harel."

"Fen'harel," she whispered in discord, "The Dire Wolf..."

And with that, Cole was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

**I.**

The first time she had heard his voice she had been lost in the fade. Whisps had taken on the forms of past lovers, the keeper, members of her clan, and they had whispered her name as she had wandered troubled through the mists. She had pierced the veil many times. She had encountered it's spirits and it's desire daemons, and she had recognized the trappings of their vast domain, but never had she come to be there without any recollection as to why or how. Even the small tendril of energy that had linked her back to her physical form had dissipated until she could feel it no longer. She had had no sense of self. No destination. Only the apparitions slinking around her had given her some concept as to whom she might have been, but even that had become tenuous and fleeting. Slowly, even the geists themselves had eventually lost interest and moved off to seek out stronger prey. Obviously, one could not be tempted if they could no longer hold goals and ambitions, or lust... 

Geraint, a young city elf that they had recently brought into the clan, and that they had lost almost immediately to a pair of scavenging black wolves, had knelt beside her to run a cold transparent hand up the inside of her inner thigh. At first she had been pleased to see him, as she had welcomed him to the clan with a night in-between her legs and she had found him to be both gentle and kind, but as she had watched him then, his face had begun to distort and blur and she had quickly lost the memory of him. The whole of him had begun morphing and changing until only a black gape had served as his countenance, and though the fade had quickly rushed in to try to fill it with something of consequence to her, all that it could sustain were a pair of hands. Without a sturdier form to cling to even they had simply turned to vapor and weaved aimlessly in and out between her legs. 

Sensing that she could offer no more, the mists closest to her had cleared slowly leaving her to sit alone in the dim twilight that forever permeated the fade. A single tree had made up the whole of her surroundings, and it had failed miserably in it's attempt to be one. The branches had been bare and skeletal and it had seemed as though she could not bring herself to mentally conjure more. If the fade were indeed a mirror to the dreamer's mind, then this certainly had not bode well. 

Staring down at her hands, she had been collected enough to become alarmed at their growing transparency. It had appeared that if she did not reconnect with her solid form soon, she would be doomed to join the ethereal ranks there within the abyss. And though It was a lovely place to visit, she had had no desire to dwell there, permanently. 

"Aneth ara, andaran atish'an." 

The voice that had eased the silence had been rich and low, polished like a small stone at the base of a fast moving brook. And though it had not yet chosen a shape, she had heard the intelligence behind it. The dialect had been uncommon, the emphasis on the syllables as though whomever spoke them had learned them from reading ancient texts rather than from speaking it conversationally. She had been convinced he was a daemon. A mage in her position would have been looking to make a trade, of sorts. Its timing would have been impeccable, though she had assumed they'd both only end up disappointed. 

"I mean you no harm, Lethallan," it had continued, convalescing slowly as though it were previously made up entirely of fog and was struggling then to accomplish more. "I 've come to guide you. There isn't much time." 

She had squinted narrowly as the figure before her had fully emerged. Perhaps the fact that she had never known him had made it more difficult for her to perceive him. She had had no references to draw upon and the fade worked in mysterious ways. In either case, whatever it had initially planned to be, it only appeared to her then as little more than the standard caricature of a tall elvhen man. It had not bothered to materialize hair, or much of anything in the way of clothing. It had worn a simple tunic and had had all the trappings of a thin simple hedge mage. A very...beige...hedge mage. 

"Who are you?" she had demanded. 

"We can deal with the questions, later. If you do no come now, there will be little need for them." 

She had been taken aback by his abruptness. She had also thought that if he were indeed a daemon, he was very poor at it. 

"And why should I trust you?" 

"Because if you do not, you will die. I've managed to slow the spreading, but that will make little difference if we do not hurry." 

"The spreading?" 

So, it had come down to this. She could have continued to wander lost throughout the fade and waited until it utterly chose to consume her, or she could trust him. 

"Fenedhis lasa..." she had cursed, and she had meant it. 


	3. Chapter 3

II.

Despite his quiet guarded nature, and direct pointed words, he had delivered her through the fade and returned her to her abandoned form unharmed. Even if that form had later been chained and bound and relentlessly interrogated for hours, he had fulfilled his end of the bargain; though to what ends she could not have been sure. In truth, she had come to believe that she had conjured him, herself; that she had created him as a means of freeing herself from what had appeared to be, at the time, as an impossible prison. He had been calm and dutiful. Apparently, that had been all she had needed in order to return to the mortal plain from whence she'd come. It had made as much sense as anything else that had landed her into the waiting lap of the fledgling Inquisition.

Resigned to this, it was not until his eyes had met hers for the first time in Haven, grim as Cassandra had brought her to stand ignorant and defiant before a large rift outside the Temple of Sacred Ashes, that she had accepted that he was indeed incredibly real. And she was not the only one that had recognized him. The magic that had formed the anchor within the palm of her right hand, a magic she had not yet come to completely understand, had also known him. It had pulsed its acquiescence at once, tendrils of green energy trailing towards him as though reaching for a waiting lover. Solas...

That singular moment had rendered her at even greater odds with the world, and she had stood motionlessly as he had reached for her wrist and urged her to hold her hand both stretched out and prostrate in order to close the recent tear in the veil. The anchor, knowing she did not yet have enough power in reserve, had naturally attempted to tap into his mana pool, instead. She had sensed it's coaxing, it's power gliding against his until he had allowed it in, and as their energies had suddenly merged the connection to him had been both unexpected and intense. Their powers had become inexplicably bound and as their auras had begun pulsing in unison, she had felt it as they had both begun to build, their energies pooling into one another until it had finally coursed through her as a single conduit and released itself through the anchor to seal the greater expanse of the breach.

Panting, the entirety of it had brought her trembling to her knees, and it had only been with Cassandra's help that she had been able to return to a standing position. As she had regained her footing in the mud, she had felt Solas' apology long before it had actually whispered through the unwinding thread that had still loosely connected them through the fade.

"Ir abelas," he had said. "I will be more careful in the future."

And with that, he had cut his ties to her and left her alone with nothing but her own thoughts,once more. But the intimacy of it, the act of having another mage's essence within her as though she were merely a cup to carry water, had left her flushed and slightly aroused. She had wondered if it had been the same for him. Had she inadvertently, and very nearly, seduced him there where he had stood?

There was little that the whole of Thedas understood less than the elves and the mages. How would the humans amongst them have reacted if they had serendipitously fallen upon each other, and without so much as a long introduction, made love amongst the emerging daemons? She had doubted it would have done much to win them over to her side, but perhaps it would have cured her of her early curiosity of Solas. Perhaps it would have changed the course of everything.

Who was this mage that had found her in the fade when she had no longer known herself? Why did her magic respond to him as though he were every bit as much a part of it as she was?

Those burning questions had lead her down a path that would bind her to him for an eternity. But even on her death bed many years hence, she would still swear to anyone that asked that he had been worth it. Even if it had cost her her heart. And a good deal of her soul...


	4. Chapter 4

III.

The eventual path back to the keep had been a long and tiring one. The rifts in and around Haven had taken what little she had had left and returned her a bit worse for wear. Even though Solas had bore the brunt of most of the energy required, serving repeatedly as the equivalent of an elvhen lightening rod had burnt through what little fortitude she had had left. And with Solas' proclamation that he did not think her responsible for the breach, she had spent the majority of their trek bringing up the far rear of the party and being dragged from rift to rift in order to be pitted against their legions of differently flavored fade daemons. They had already begun discussing her new fate as though she were not amongst them, and though all she had wanted to do was to return to her clan she had feared anything other than silent acceptance would perhaps draw them further away from canonizing her as the new "Herald of Andraste"and closer to remembering her obvious mortality and dashing her once more into the loathed role of probable heathen assassin. She had not felt particularly holy or ordained, not even at that time, but she had known that if this new vision of theirs would serve to keep her from being chained up again that she would have sung the chant of light naked in the center of camp day in and day out until they had begged for her to stop.

"So, it appears you are no longer to be the unwitting scape goat for a budding inquisition."

Solas had come to stand in the doorway of the four leaky walls she had been given in which to reside. She had eventually given over to it as they would not deign to allow her to sleep outside. With the door open, and several windows within easy enough reach, she had eventually convinced herself that she was not suffocating. She had never stayed indoors nor slept in a human bed. Even in her future years she would never figure out how the shemlen could stand it.

"I know I have you to thank for that," she had said. " I would have been hung by now had you not been there. I never would have known how to use...this." She had gingerly taken a poultice he had been offering and applied it to the back of her wrists, turning the right one over to stare at the new mark on her palm, now forever engrained there. "I just wanted you to know that I appreciated your help, Solas. I will never forget it."

The look that had crossed his face had passed far too quickly for her to read, but in the end he had smiled, slightly. She had decided it suited him.

"Then perhaps I will stay."

"You mean you had thought to leave?"

He had gestured for the poultice and she had passed it to him, averting her gaze to hide her expression.

"While you had lain unconcious, I had researched the anchor. Never had I encountered anything of it's like before. Nothing I found in the fade, or in texts, could explain it's nature."She had seated herself and watched as he had knelt and hovered fingers above a raw spot on her ankle. The chains Cullen had initially put her in had rubbed them to the point of blisters, and travel and exhaustion had done very little to heal them on their own."I had tried to run tests," he had continued, " but nothing I did could answer the questions the Inquisition posed. In time, they accused me of being duplicitous. They questioned my motives. Though I am the only one that seems to have come here of my own free will, they would have seen me bound and chained beside you if you had not returned from behind the veil. I'm an apostate surrounded by the chantry. How welcomed do you expect me to remain? "

He had leant long thin fingers to the tender application of the herbal compress as he had spoken, and she had hissed through her teeth at the coolness of it. It had smelled of elfroot and river mud."But, you've come here to help. I'd never allow for them to harm you."

"And how would you stop them, Lavellan?"

"However I had to."

For a moment in time he had seemed genuinely amused.

"Ah. A fearless warrior. I am fortunate, it seems, that for now we are on the same side. You do have such an indomitable focus."

"Indomitable focus?"

"Our time here has been short, but I have yet to see it dominated. Though I imagine that site would be...fascinating."

"Then perhaps in time we can find out, together."

Concentrating, she had allowed a bit of the anchor's fade energy to completely encircle him, his own magic responding as though it had been awaiting anxiously to receive it.

When at first he had stood he had looked down at her with something slightly akin to interest. Though it had quickly manifested in to something much more primal when his magic had readily risen to tease at hers.

"It would seem that the anchor was still in it's infancy when first I encountered it. New magic is always highly susceptible to it's surroundings and I have spent a great deal of time in the fade. It has taken a bit of my own magic within it. Like will always respond to like."

He had opened his aura to her then and allowed for her energies to mingle with his, the two unique strains of power intertwining and merging until she could no longer disinguish between them. Though she could imediately tell he had errected a barrier in order to protect her from prying into his thoughts, intentionally or otherwise, a single image had emerged. It had been merely a flicker, but it had been one that would never leave her. It was of a large gray wolf laying next to a sleeping woman, her small elvhen form naked under a wanning moon. As it's eyes had gleamed back at her her breath had caught and she had been imediately overwhelemed with an intense feeling of foreboding.

"Be careful where you let your magic wander," he had warned. "There are many things from within the fade that it may also attempt to adhere to. It is still too unpredicable. It may try to take power from where ever it can."

With that he had gently lifted his hand to the side of her face, his index finger and thumb making the shape of an "L" as he had rested it against her temple.

"Asha, hamin..."

Slowly, and with a well trained control, he had let the accumulative energy between them filter back through her, the warmth of it permeating her body and spilling out against her skin from within. As the sensation itself had subsided, the consistent throbbing within her bones had ebbed and the angry welts along her arms and ankles had faded into a perfect nothingness.

"You should have been nursing lyrium droughts upon our return," he had said, simply. "You have barely enough power to draw a proper torch. It is obvious our companions understand little of magic."

"Then I suppose that is yet another reason I should be thankful for your presence here"

He had bowed his head slightly, shifting his eyes up to meet hers only briefly. "You are no longer a prisoner here. Take what you would need."

As he turned to leave, she had wondered if that offer had included himself.

A/N: I know Solas could have just healed her without ever having bothered with a poultice, but I assume using magic on another mage without a direct request or invite to do so would be rather taboo. Especially if their magics already respond to each others as theirs has been wont to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know Solas could have just healed her without ever having bothered with a poultice, but I assume using magic on another mage without a direct request or invite to do so would be rather taboo. Especially if their magics already respond to each others as theirs has been wont to do.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is rated M. Lavellan unwittingly succumbs to the advances of a desire daemon. Questionable consent (with her being under a daemon's thrall and all) and bondage elements.

IV.

Over time, Solas' concerns regarding the anchor had proven to be well founded; it had held a hunger all its own, and where it had only sought to grow in power, spirits and daemons were drawn to it like a beacon. Whether they were lured to it as a means of seeking passage to the other side, or if they had merely thought it to be a simple way of drawing power directly from the fade, she had never known, but they did sometimes gravitate towards her in hordes as though she were in fact a rift unto herself.

For those reasons, and others, it had become quite apparent to her that she would have a need to learn greater defensive spells.  
She had already seen the future that Alexius and the Venatori had had in store for them while parlaying in Redcliff for a greater mage assistance with the Breach. With an encroaching daemon army marching somewhere off in the distance, she had already had to realize that her knack for protective wards and burial rites would not be enough to sustain her if she had ever wished to survive for any length of time. And though Dorian had seemed far more than capable of holding his own in combat, and was perhaps even amiable enough to have considered tutelage, Solas had already seemed to have taken to the role of mentor rather naturally. He would never claim to be a brethren to her people, or to any anyone's, but she would always feel a comfort and familiarity in his companionship. And despite his words, his heritage was indeed elvhen and his knowledge of the arcane would always far surpass anyone else's that she would ever have a hope to encounter; even if it wasn't always his information on the fade that would call her to him...

It was deep in the Hinterlands when this had first become the most apparent, his sidelong glances and the occasional hand resting innocently at the small of her back manifesting itself at last in to something she could no longer choose to ignore. They had set up camp at the rocky base of a large forested hilltop, Cassanda and Blackwall stoking the fire as they had spoken of Warden history and planned a course of action against the rebel templars to their west. As their voices had droned on, she had excused herself to her tent and had easily found entry into her bedroll and in to the fade.

For a mage, the fade can cater itself to a great deal many things. On that particular evening it had chosen to focus it's accumulative energies on her more carnal urges, repressed as they were, and the desire daemon that had chosen to heed the call had been honing it's craft for well over a millennia.

"He would see you bound," it had said, and that voice that had caressed like silk along her spine had also slowly culminated itself into the horned visage of a small woman. As it had become more interminable, it had sighed it's pleasure at the idea, it's hands cupping it's small upturned breasts before sliding them down to travel along the full expanse of it's hips. "Would you open for him if he pinned you in chains to his altar? Would you cum for him, Lavellan?"

Though she had not yet come to understand the implications of the alter, her body had shaken at the the anticipation of it and she had fought to try to deny her response. To grant a daemon even the slightest permission was to grant it your soul. It would feed upon it until you could no longer remember your earthen form and it would take it for itself. As an abomination, it could travel the worldly plane and all that you ever were would be left to exist as a mere whisp within the veil. This cautionary tale had been ladled upon her since the very first time she had ever been able to hold a staff, and yet...

"Yes." Her mouth had formed the words with a breathless sound she had scarcely even heard herself, and as her heart had pounded at the sudden realization of what she had done, she had felt the stone form cold and rough against her back as the shackles had fallen hard into place.

"Then you will have your hedge mage..."

Torches along all four walls had flashed ablaze with the dim green glow of fade light, and as the room had become more illuminated she had realized at once that her body had become slick with an anointing oil that was sickly sweet with the malignant odor of Felandaris root. Though she had known subconsciously that she had a great need to be panicked, she had not been able to muster the will or the energy for it. Where there should have been fear there was only a comforting warmth, and where there should have been a desire to fight there was only lust and a pool of moisture beading in-between her legs.

As she had turned from the alter, it's cude form resting securely upon a raised dais, she had found that Solas had entered the threshold of the great chamber. The robes he had worn were vivid and ornate, the rare dark stones hemmed along the wide seams flickering in the twilight. As he had approached her, he had discarded his clothing with a simple casual gesture, his fingers trailing along the curve of her calf and the flatness of her stomach before finally coming to a rest in the valley between her breasts.

"Did binding yourself here finally give you the permission you needed to surrender? " His thumb had lifted to graze the fullness of her bottom lip then, his eyes lingering on hers as she had shuddered against the chains. "Are you finally willing to let someone else share in your control?"

"Yes," she had scarce had to say the word, as the daemon had already known it had scored it's prize. Eveything she had ever known of want and need had paled in comparison to the intense yearning that had taken up a residence within her from the moment he had touched her. And though she had scrambled to find reason, and though she had forced herself to acknowledge on some level that the entity before her had merely been an amalgam of what the fade had only thought she had wanted of Solas, she had already surrendered to her fate. She was going to die there, and she was going to do it while begging for more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Youre welcome? The next chapter will be geting down to the nitty gritty. I'm not sure if this is a precaution or an invite.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is rated M for strong sexual content.

V.

The oil upon her skin had coated his as he had pinned her fully beneath him, her legs parting for him as he had slid against the slick wet gleam of her body. As she had allowed him within her she had moaned her acquiescence, the eyes that had watched her writhe and flush not the wistful pensive blue of the man she had truly wanted, but an all consuming black, instead; a black so complete that it had devoured all illusion of that form having ever been elvhen, at all. As his hands had risen to encircle her wrists, the skin pale where it had been lain bare bellow the restriction of the manacles, she had wanted to feel more powerless and afraid, but every inch of her had only screamed the need to touch him, to wrap her arms around him, to link her legs about his waist so as to feel him more fully inside of her.

Responding to her silent cravings, he had risen to his knees, his hands sliding beneath her and cupping her ass so as to lift her more readily into his lap. Adjusting, he had been able to take her far more aggressively then, his hands supporting her hips as he had thrust repeatedly into the wet molten core of her waiting quim. Wrapping her hands into the chains, and threading her fingers tightly throughout their links, she had been able to pull herself back against them for leverage, her pelvis grinding roughly against his in order to form a stronger polyrhythm.

Breathless, she had felt as the salt of her sweat had burned a path along the many scrapes and bruises that had formed along the pale complexion of her skin, the chaffing becoming more and more evident as he had driven her with a fierceness and determination that she had never thought capable of her small delicate stature. With each gasp and sigh of arousal, she had died a little bit more; clenching, screaming, orgasming, all of it claiming yet another of her fading memories. But even as her own name had become more than she could recall, she had not longed for freedom or for greater cognizance. She had only thought of the weight of him, the bite of his nails into her flesh, and the scrape of his teeth against the swelling globes of her breasts. He was going to kill her and she was going to use her last breath to whisper his name. Solas...

"Capernica, stop."

The daemon upon her had halted it's machinations suddenly, and drawn back upon it's haunches; it's voice a languid and disaffected caress as it had pretended to sulk. And though it had ultimately decided to retain Solas' form, it had quickly become apparent that it had only done so mockingly.

"My name will not grant you any favors, here. That entity has not existed in centuries," It had said. "Long has it been since I have seen your kind, but the elf is mine, she has accepted our...arrangement. I am within my right."

"Were you not once a spirit of passion and love?" The voice that had responded was calm and familiar, and though she had not yet been able to make out his features in the lowlight, his demeanor and posturing had been completely unmistakable.

"You care for her," it had smiled then and shifted slowly into something curvy, horned and feminine."Why have you not taken her, then? The fruit is so ripe the juices run. I have merely responded to her need."

Spreading itself out upon her it had pinned her once more, it's lips parting hers as it had kissed her, deeply. Fighting unconsciousness, she had still been able to feel the gentle tease of it's nipples as it has writhed suggestively against her, it's knees forcing her legs back apart so it could rub its warm clit against her own.

"I will ask you once more, let her return."

The daemon had licked from the base of her throat to the tip of her ear before turning to face Solas directly, it's voice still a heady blend of aged mead and honey. "And what would you offer me in return?"

"I offer an exchange."

His face had been a mask of lines and shadows as he had moved closer to the alter, the daemon baring it's teeth with a territorial hiss as he had looked down upon them.

"An exchange?"

"Agreed."

A thin smile had played across it's lips as it had fully taken in his lithe appearance and stern countenance, it's verve at his timely proposal almost palpable. "So much longing and denial..." It had licked it's lips as it had slipped gracefully to it's feet, sashaying towards him with a playful twitch to it's tail as it had circled him with a true predator's grace. "Yes, a fair trade..."

As it had stroked his face and bit at his lower lip, it had seemed to remember her presence there and had gestured nonchalantly to cast her bonds aside.

"I can see why you wanted this one. You're free to go. I promise to take excellent care of him."

Too weak to move she had simply shaken her head, her body a crumpled mass upon the cold dirt floor, "No."

As it had slipped his tunic off to fall at his feet, he had met her plaintive gaze with a bold one. She could sense his will for her to leave, but she had only shaken her head, once more.

"So loyal! But, if you are to stay, then you must watch."

And from the prison of her own body, that is exactly what she had done.


	7. Chapter 7

VI.

Solas' nude form had stood silently as the daemon had wound itself coyly about him, his face as flat and unresponsive as that of a marble sentinel left for centuries to guard the gates of an ancient elvhen temple.

"I could make this very enjoyable," it had purred, "All you must do is...let go." It had kissed his collar bone and placed it's hands upon his chest, the daemon's face shifting slowly to more keenly resemble her own more delicate elvhen features as she had remained prone and prostrate on the floor. "I know what you need. Let me give it to you."

As it had kissed him, Solas had shaken his head and pushed it away. Though his words were still stern, his eyes had held a softness she had not yet understood.

"No, not like this. Lavellan is a child. An innocent. This shall remain between you and I."

"You still try to appeal to, Capernica. That creature died at the hands of human men centuries ago. There is nothing left of her, now."

"Yes, I have seen her memories in the fade. I know what she has suffered."

"You know nothing!" The daemon had immediately seethed, it's color deepening to a darker heliotrope as it's tail had coiled in upon itself. "Do not attempt to speak to me of such things!"

"She was a gentle spirit and they used her to lure women. What happened was not her fault."

"She was bound! They had sung songs of longing, but what they had wanted was not love, it was not pure! It was dark and malignant. She was their slave!" The daemon had begun to stalk in agitated patterns, it's horns growing in size along with it's hostility. "I replaced her. I became what she needed me to be. And when their bindings had at last finally waned, I took her captures one by one. They died in the ecstasy that I gave them!"

"You took vengeance against those that had wronged her. You sought retribution for the women she could not protect."

"And I shall never again do the bidding of another!"

Solas had gestured plaintively. "Were you not sent here by your master? Has the elder one not bound you, as well?"

A flame of bright indigo had ignited between it's horns, the center of it burning white and hot. "Who am I to deny the will of a God?"

"A rightful god would never need to demand your aid. Does he not have power enough to serve his own ends?"

The tip of it's tail had twitched, it's eyes narrowing in thought.

"You owe your allegiances to no one," he had continued. " You are both beautiful and rare. Why allow yourself to be subjected to the whims of a false god when you are a power unto yourself?"

It's horns had recessed visibly as it had continued to evaluate him, it's eyes ablaze. "You would see Capernica, returned?"

"You protected her. You gave her the strength she needed to overcome. Now, the world needs her kind more than ever."

Gradually, the daemon had approached him, searching him meticulously for proof of a future betrayal. '"I have offered you whatever it is you most desire, and it would be this?

Solas had touched it's cheek then, and brushed his lips fully against the breadth of it's forehead, "It is."

"Then, what of you? What purpose would this serve?"

There had been a pleading curiosity in it's voice, an attempt to understand his motivations.

"Then we will all be free."

Defeated, the daemon had sunk warily to it's knees, it's head hung low as it had consented. "Then be gone. And I bid you both to forget this daemon that once preyed alone in the fade."

He had gathered up the daemon in a loose embrace as it had appeared to shrink in upon itself. What had once been, no longer was or could be. And all that had been allowed to remain was the faintest apparition of a slender woman. And though her glow was soft and dim, the being itself seemed warm and powerful.

"Ar lasa mala revas, Capernica," he had welcomed. And in the twilight beyond the veil, the newly liberated spirit of love and passion had kissed him as such.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _*Ar lasa mala revas-_ You are now free


	8. Chapter 8

VII.

"The dreamer awakens."

Stiff and impossibly sore, she had watched quietly as the grey tendrils of early pre-dawn had wound thier way lazily through the dark leather tethers that had bound the front most aperture of the tent; the shadows of nearby brush shifting in the breeze to distort the pale sculpted planes of Solas' familiar face. From his posturing, and his practiced bend of knee, he had appeared to have been kneeling beside her in meditation for quite some time.

"Once again, I owe you my gratitude," she had said, finally. "This marks the second time that you have successfully stolen me back from the fade."

"Then, perhaps you do still have a need for a wandering hedge mage apostate. Your consummate warriors continue to sleep soundly, nearby."

Though his voice had been light and good-natured, she had averted her gaze in acknowledgement of her sins; silently cursing the slow heat that had crept along the nape of her neck to more proudly reside at the very tip of her ears.

"You are ashamed. Please, do not be. Any choice that you were given was merely an illusion. You did not summon her, she was sent to collect a blood debt. An encounter such as that would have ended a lesser woman." "

"A woman? It was but a short time ago that you called me a child."

"Ah. My words offended you. I did not intend for them to. We are all children beyond the veil, Lavallen. The realm of dreams and spirits is vast and forever changing. Their kind often refer to all those that dwell on the physical plane as leanaí."

"Leanaí?"

"Yes. It means, 'the young ones.' In ancient Tevinter, it was believed that spirits could not retain their native tongue after death. Those who live in the mists have created a language of their own that they have cultivated for thousands of years. Early occultists referred to it as, 'Spiorad.' According to the priests dedicated to their study, spirits often see the leanai as being in constant need of their help and their guidance. They feel it is their responsibility to aid them as they believe themselves to be the higher beings. My intention was not to lessen who you are, Aneira, but to remind her of who she was. "

Prior to that moment, she had never thought Solas had known her by anything other than her clan name. For someone outside of the Dalish to speak it- it had quickened her blood. Only those trusted by the keeper, and welcomed into the inner-circle, were ever given access to the clan's individual names. She had known that it would have seemed illogical and superstitious to most, but as all mage's were already acutely aware, all names held power. And for most of the elvhen, their names were all that they had had left of their once proud and dwindling ancestry. They saw it as something worthy of protection. Surrounded by shemlen and flat-ears, she had, as well. But, to hear those syllables fall so casually and warm from his lips, and so unexpectedly? She had always wanted for him to know it. She had been trying to find a way to give it to him that would signify the importance of it. But, how had he already come by it? That element of surprise had forced her to temporarily forget her previous feelings of being slighted.

"You... know my name."

"Yes." The half smile that he had given her had been kind and somehow somber. "Do you often choose to forget your dreams?"

It had been common knowledge to most that in sleep mages often chose to roam the fade. There they were free to create temporary manifestations of their ambitions, or to perhaps divulge well kept personal secrets to figments-the embodiments and personifications of their intended. You were to never make a true demand of the fade, lest a daemon try to grant it, but if you played well within the rules you were still safe to indulge in the spectacle of the dream. You were still safe enough to wander through ancient elvhen ruins. Perhaps even safe enough to tell one particular reoccurring incarnation of Solas that his presence within Haven had been the only thing that had kept a scared and fledgling hedge mage grounded and sane amongst the man-made structures always far too removed from the rivers and the dirt.

In one such encounter, she had even gone so far as to confess to him that the memory of his magic curling against her skin had been enough to make her dive her fingers deep in-between her legs as she had arched her back against the gnarled bark of an ancient lake tree, far from the prying ears and eyes of the forward camp. As he had listened, she had described to him in detail how she had cupped her breasts and pinched her nipples until she had come hard against her hand, only realizing after she had slid bare into the grass that she had been performing for a large gray wolf only several yards away. He had suggested that it had been attracted to her scent, and she had teased about rubbing it's fur against her skin...

On the dreamscape, Solas had always seemed attentive and at ease, always within reach but never touching; a true and proper illusion. That had made it easier for her to turn experiences into words. That had made it easier for her to...

As the full spectrum of that new realization had materialized, she had finally understood why his finding her chained beneath a larger more sinister shade of himself had not garnered more of a response. She had not simply been conjuring a specter in which to share her inner most monologues. Through use of their symbiotic magics, and the anchor, there had been a permanent thread that had connected them through the fade. It had allowed for him to find her while facing Capernica, and it had allowed for her to call to him when passing through the veil. He had known her name because she had told him. He had been coming to her each time she had unkowingly beckoned to him.

As she had fumbled through a maze of her own racing thoughts, he had stared at her intently, his eyes narrowing slightly as he had searched her face.

"It just didn't seem possible," she had said, pushing herself to her knees as though that one action alone could have freed her from any and every implication. "The things that I must have said to you."

"You were a mystery. You still are. But, you've changed...everything."

There had been something in his voice. Something in the way that he had looked upon her.

Floundering for words, and quickly lost in the minutiae, she had raised up upon both knees and kissed him; brushing her lips against his as she had awaited for his inevitable hesitation and restraint. But, whatever form of displeasure she had expected, none was ever forthcoming; his mouth spreading against hers with a ferocity that had forced her to cling to him.

Lifting her against him, he had raised a hand to the back of her neck, his hand working into a fistful of her hair as she had raked nails through the loose fabric of his tunic. As he had grazed teeth against the curve of her jawbone, she had reveled in the natural scent of him, the combination a heady mixture of grass and parchment oils.

"We shouldn't. Not even here." His words had been a whisper of regret against the hollow of her throat, the words taking time to form a clear and coherent meaning.

"Here?"

"Yes. Where is it that you thought we were?"

As he had spoken, she had realized that the dim gray light from outside the tent had never once shifted with the rise of the sun. Nor had the others ever risen from their tents to stoke the fires for the brewing of coffee and porridge.

"We are still in the fade. How had I not known?"

"You were weak. You needed time to gather your strength before attempting to bridge the void."

"Solas..."

"There will be time to speak on this more in the future. But for now, it is time for you to...wake up."

Alone in her tent in the Hinterlands she had done just that, and the sudden silence, marked even further by his abrupt absence, had been truly excruciating.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I clearly took a few liberties, here. Leanaí and Spiorad are actually Gaelic. I haven't found any indicator that the dalish have any problem with being on a first name basis with anyone, but since no one ever calls her by hers I figured this would give an interesting reason for it. I also decided this worked better for me than her and Solas wandering around Haven while in the fade at a later date. As a mage, I couldn't understand how she didn't realize where they were. Haven had already clearly been destroyed. I wanted the Inquisitor to be a little more on top of things.


	9. Chapter 9

VIII.

In the safety of daylight, the fade had always seemed more like a dark yarn spun by the voices of bards than an actual plane of existence. She had still been able to feel him, still been able to smell him as though he had not actually chosen to push her further away. But she had always known there was nothing that she could do or say that would ever bring her closer to understanding him. He had always seemed to want her every bit as much as he hadn't.

In the myriad of days that had followed, Haven had fallen. The mages had united to close the Breach, and the forthcoming celebration had ended with the infiltration of Corypheus and a generous amount of bloodshed. It might have seemed like a victory to her council, at the time, but to her it had been a battle hard won. The same power that had given her the edge that she had needed to survive against the ancient Tavinter magister, had also been the power that she'd come to realize was still slowly killing her. It had all seemed rather counterintuitive.

And though it did inevitably gain her the leadership of the Inquisition, it had never been a position that she had ever truly wanted. Even if, as Solas had so casually pointed out, an elf had not been held in such esteem in time immemorial. Despite her own personal feelings on the matter, It had seemed that fate had had plans for her far greater than what she herself might have actually chosen to aspire to. Bleeding from the fallout of Haven, and crawling through the snow towards a ball of fade fire she had easily ascribed to the rift mage and the rest of her waiting party, she had succinctly thought that if that were indeed the case, then fate had already seriously overestimated the potential survival rate of at least one of it's chosen ones.

"She's over there."

She had recognized Dorian's cadence, even if it hadn't been his arms that had plucked her unceremoniously from her position laying facedown in a snow drift.

"Hurry. Place her by the fire. Let me tend to her."

Solas had taken her easily from Cullen's grasp, his voice thin and concise as deft hands had immediately wrapped her in woolen blankets and deposited her limp and frozen next to the heat of the flames.

"It looks like frostbite. Do you think we got to her in time?"

Cullen's pleasant voice had held genuine concern as he, and everyone with him, was told, rather pointedly, to go elsewhere.

"Healing magic requires a wide breadth," Dorian had explained, calmly. "We'll do neither of them any good standing about here."

Battle worn, and worse for wear, that had seemed liked explanation enough for the tattered masses, and with him as their impromptu ringleader, they had all been led to a much warmer destination presumably with better sources of wine.

In their absence, Solas had finally been able to undress her enough to place warm hands against her cold damp skin; his lips pressing to whisper against her ear though he had known she would not be able to fully respond. " I will have to remove all of your clothes, now, they are too wet to be of use to you. You need body heat and your temperature is already far too low. We are going to have to use mine. I hope you'll forgive me, I can try to be less forceful in the future."

As she had been stripped down in layers, she had felt as the surrounding chill had tried to gnaw straight through to the bone; his body, then also completely free of clothing, smooth and warm as he had pressed it fully behind hers, his arms bringing the blankets in tightly against them as he had formed himself to fit perfectly against her.

And though she had finally fallen asleep with the feel of his lips pressed lightly against the back of her neck, it had been thick gray fur and a muzzle that had lent her the warmth that she had needed in order to carry her through to dawn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to my reviewers, Ioialoha and Kissofdeath for your continued input and support.


	10. Chapter 10

VIIII.

That night she had dreamed of her clan. She had scanned over each of their faces, smiled at each of their welcomed embraces, and had allowed for the feeling of relief to completely wash over her. There had been something she was forgetting, something just off in the distance that she had needed to be attending to, but whatever it had been it had become obsolete in the reverie of her return.

Free at last from human persecution, she had finally been allowed to dance naked among the trees; the leaves brushing against her skin as she had worshipped in the moonlight, her skin pale and luminescent in the darkness. The dirt, cool and baptismal, had covered her in a thin layer of silt, re-dedicating her once more to the service of the ancient elvhen God whose vallasin had come to purposely mark her body. But then,as she had begun following it's intricate pattern along the long slender lines of her form, it had soon failed to resemble the blood writing that had denoted her service to June as she had always intended, and had slowly taken on the black crude calling of another deity, entirely.

Slipping into the shallows of a dark quiet lake, she had attempted to scrub at her skin with stones, sobbing as she had tried to scrape away the totem that had somehow stained her skin with such broad and intricate strokes. But no matter how much she had bled, and how raw her fingers had become, the markings had chosen to remain much the same. Everyone who looked upon her would have no choice but to see his regalia and know that she too had betrayed her people; betrayed them in the name of a human God in which she had never truly believed. Now there would be only one God that would ever choose to hear her prayers. He had sought her out and found her worthy and left his vallasin to claim her flesh.

"Enansal, Fen'Harel!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has more to do with Lavellan 's own insecurities about being considered the Inquisition's "Herald of Andraste" than anything sinister Solas is doing behind the scenes. In this, at least, he is innocent. So far. Thanks for the reviews and subscriptions. Questions, comments? Hit me. I live for it.


	11. Chapter 11

X.

She had awoken with a start, her body numb and tingling as Solas had aided a potent amber liquid to her lips; her head tilted back upon his lap to allow for the mixture to have a proper passage through. When she had flailed and attempted to sit up, he had placed a firm hand at her center, forcing her to remain steadily in place.

"Try to lie still. Your muscles have started to atrophy. This should help, and perhaps it will also lend a little more warmth."

Blinking up at him, she had gagged slightly around the bitter taste of herbs, her eyes tracing the lines that had seemed to etch years around the corners of his mouth and eyes. She had had to force herself to quell the urge to follow along them with the tips of her fingers.

"You haven't slept..."

He had continued to hold her, though it was not his voice that had given the reply.

"Would that we could. You've been putting us both through our paces these past several hours." Dorian had lifted a warm cloth to her forehead as Solas had guided her through a round of cold resistance tonic. She had grimaced, realizing that they must have been running on a very short supply if it had already had to be cut so heavily with spindleweed. "Don't worry," he had continued on in true congenial Dorian fashion, "I've chosen to forgive you. But what you need now, my little Dalish snowflake, is a warm bath and copious amounts of mead. Luckily for you, I seem to have arranged for both."

"A bath? Here?"

"Not a proper one. But, there is a spring that pools within one of the small caves, nearby. "

"A hot spring?"

Dorian had actually smiled and shaken his head at her optimism. "I'm afraid not, but I'm sure that that is something that our dear, Solas, could arrange. He's been quite the attending physician, already."

The two had exchanged a brief round of glances before he had properly chosen to excuse himself.

"I've never tended to a naked woman. I doubt now would be the ideal time to try. But, if either of you should have a need of me..."

In the resounding silence, she had watched him take his leave, sauntering as he had fallen slowly from view of the fire.

"Have the two of you finally made peace?"

Solas had made a noise somewhere in-between amusement and disdain, her body weight shifting easily into his arms as he had lifted her.

"It appears that it would take more than an evening of blood magic and the gift of a single fire rune to make that so."

"Blood magic?" She had swayed a bit with his gait, his bare feet making his steps purposeful as he had picked his way carefully along the snow covered stones leading up the natural path to the cave face.

"You were going into shock. You were too weak for me to draw upon the anchor, and most of our provisions were used by the Redcliff mages to try to help you reseal the Breach. We used what was available to us."

"I didn't know either of you were familiar with...those arts."

"Blood magic is not, by it's very nature, evil. As in all things, it is based souly upon intent. Most mages in Tavinter have at least some basic training in its usage. Like lyrium, it is a source of power, nothing more."

"That's why you sent for, Dorian."

"Of course. Our companions have just begun to fully trust you. Maybe, perhaps, they have even begun to trust me. I doubt there would have been an easy way to explain it to someone who was not yet familiar. We've come a long way just to be executed as maleficarum."

"Yes, "she had nodded in full agreement, "and Dorian has told me rather a lot recently that he is far too pretty to die. Were you able to heal yourself easily, after?"

"Your concern humbles me, but it is unnecessary. Healing and blood loss do not often coincide well within a single mage. One requires energy to be passed from one person to another. The other simply takes it. Dorian, provided the one so that I could, in turn, provide the other."

Sitting her down to rest against the dampness of the cave wall, he had used his right hand to call forth a ball of fade fire, it's light guiding his way to the edge of the internal spring as he had both activated the rune and watched it sink.

"Dorian, opened a vein...for me?"

"Several."

"I do not enjoy the thought of someone causing themselves pain just in order to help me..."

"Would you not have done the same for him?"

"If it were truly the only way-"

"Then you must learn to receive as well as give. Though, perhaps, you should offer to buy him another cravat. It seems silk does not hold properly against ritual blood letting."

In a moment of surprise, she had allowed herself to laugh, fully. It had appeared that Solas had been capable of humor, after all.

"And how many more times, exactly, do you plan to save my life, Solas? This...fledgling Inquisitor whose greatest new foe now appears to be... snow. "

If she had ever seen him tsmile before, it had not mattered until then. There had been something thoughtful about it, as well as something inherently and hauntingly sad.

"As many times as necessary. But, if I have ever truly saved your life, it is only because you have completely changed mine."

As he had returned to kneel beside her, his hands working to gently unravel her from her many various blankets, she had temporarily found herself unable to respond. She had obviously misunderstood him countless times, before. If she had been wiser, or perhaps simply less drawn to him, she might have even been able to allow for that moment to slide peacefully into an amicable silence. But, if surviving Corypheus, and...snow..., had left her with anything, it was the feeling that everything could change and quickly. She had known that if they were to ever confront the magister, again, and it was inevitable, that she might not get another opportunity to walk away. If Solas had had something that he had wished to say, she had suddenly become quite earnest in making him say it.


	12. Chapter 12

VI.

Lifting her delicately, he had taken her to perch where the water had naturally met the stone. Disrobing, he had submerged himself waist deep in order to test out the pool's varying depths

"You speak very candidly," she had, said, "and yet I can never be completely sure of what it is you are trying to tell me."

Finding the deepest parts to be the ones closest to her, he had physically pulled her down to him and allowed for the water to support her weight.

"You are not the first to say so."

Holding her to him, the heat slowly seeping into the very core of her, her muscles had begun to ease and she had finally allowed for herself to fully relax against him. Despite whatever else that might have been in the potable she had been given, alcohol, she had come to realize, had also apparently been a prime ingredient. Dorian, had mentioned mead, and it had begged to reason that that had most likely been incorporated as part of the emulsifier. Not that she had ever needed even a mild intoxicate to notice how strongly she had wanted the man against her, but there had been a soft haze that had begun to frame even her most generalized thoughts.

"Solas..."

"Aneira..."

The sound of her name had caused for her pulse to quicken. He had not spoken it aloud since last they were in the fade, together.

"My vallaslin..." she had asked, hesitantly, knowing that at first he would not be able to understand, "has it changed?"

She had expected him to question the logic of her fear, but he had helped her to stand with his aid, instead. Touching her forehead gingerly, he had followed her blood writing with tentative fingers; his eyes narrowing as though he were committing each line to memory as he had traced it through to it's terminus along her hips.

"No," he had offered, gently, "you remain the eternal maidservant of June."

"Thank you. I ...had had a dream."

"Tell me."

With his hand still at rest above her thigh, she had swallowed, roughly. "I had dreamt I had been given to another as an offering. It was a punishment... for betraying my clan."

"You were afraid. To whom were you given?"

Even as they had stood there in the collective darkness, she could still remember his marks as they had been strewn against her skin.

"I was given to, Fen'Harel."

"Ah, yes, Fen'Harel." His voice had gained a guarded tone, and though he had stared back at her he had seemed a hundred years away. Given his penchant for the fade, and everything he had seen there, it had been altogether possible that for a brief moment he had been. "Is he not the chosen bogeymen of the Dalish? What is it that you believe yourself to have done to deserve the attentions of such a dark and traitorous beast?"

"A beast?" Her face had unintentionally softened at the memory of his statues. Though his likeness was often used to ward away evil from the dwellings of the Dalish, she had always sensed within them a strange sort of melancholy. "Perhaps," she had said distractedly, " but, I think even as a child I have always pitied him, somehow."

"Pity? That is an uncommon attitude. Why should you pity him?"

Before that moment she had never even considered it. In her dream she had inherently known that she would be abandoned by her clan because she had chosen the Inquisition over her duties as their First. She had feared what his vallaslin would represent to her people. But the tale of Fen'Harel itself, as often told by the Keeper, had never been one that had ever really imbued her with any fear.

"They say that he betrayed the other Gods and sealed them away for an eternity. But, I've often wondered why. I cannot imagine that even a God would want to spend an eternity alone."

He had shaken his head slightly as though assessing something that had warranted disbelief. Though he had not chosen to express it, something unspoken had passed subtly just behind the pale blue of his eyes.

"You continue to surprise me. You have a sense of empathy beyond your years. It is- one of the things I have come to love most about you."

"I...thank you. But, I should apologize. I know you do not believe in the pantheon, as I do. I shall try to remember that not all things that happen in the fade are meant to be foreboding."

"No," almost distractedly, he had begun to trace her vallaslin once again, his fingers splaying as he had run both hands up along her sides," have you already forgotten our kiss in the fade? I am not often thrown by the things that happen in dreams. "

"It was not my intention to pressure you. It was a first for me on...many levels."

"No, it is not you. I am perhaps pressuring, myself. It has been a long time and things have always been easier for me in the fade."

"Ah-"

Guiding her towards him, he had considered her for a moment, his lips leaning down to unexpectedly brush against hers. The feel of him had been delicate and warm, but there had been a current underneath that had promised of deeper more passionate things.

"You and I..." he had looked at her as though he had been trying to will her to understand something that he was not yet at liberty to explain, "there could be complications. There are risks and considerations."

Young and naïve, she had missed the warning that he had offered, and she had merely wrapped her arms around him; simultaneously accepting both this challenge, as well as all others that she had believed loving him might later entail. "Yes," she had, agreed, "and all of that shall still be there, tomorrow. And though no one should ever be so bold as to ask for forever, there is nothing that I wouldn't sacrifice for just a few more moments alone with you, now."

Somewhere within her words he had found an answer that he had needed and he had pressed her back firmly against the bank of the spring. And as his mouth had found hers, and she had wrapped her body around his, she had whispered a prayer to Mythal that the journey ahead of them would somehow find both of them peace.

A/N: It is either embarrassing, or completely telling, that I yelled, "Get it, girl!" when writing the end of this chapter. Next chapter is gratuitous smut ahoy. I shall type until I feel that I have properly shamed both my house and my family. I have been wanting to get to this chapter for a very long time. I have asked my husband for an evening to write this out. #leave me alone I'm cheating on you with Solas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is either embarrassing, or completely telling, that I yelled, "Get it, girl!" when writing the end of this chapter. Next chapter is gratuitous smut ahoy. I shall type until I feel that I have properly shamed both my house and my family. I have been wanting to get to this chapter for a very long time. I have asked my husband for an evening to write this out. #leave me alone I'm cheating on you with Solas


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is rated M for sexual content.

XII

Within his touch there would always seem to be a certain amount of hesitancy. There would always seem to be a part of him that would pause to pull back when the rest of him had seemed primed to move forward. She would even eventually come to accept that aspect of him, but never would she notice it more than in those last fleeting moments before the first time he finally decided to take her.

He had kept her pinned against the stone, her legs wrapping around his waist as he had buried his face against the inside of her throat. And as his breath had trailed warm against her skin he had wavered, the residual adrenaline sending a fine tremor along her body as he had appeared to be weighing all the consequences of his actions.

"Always the scholar," she had said, warmly, her hands trailing in long languid paths along the full expanse of his back as she had spoken against his ear. "Always judging the past against the possibilities of the future. There will come a point in time, ma vhenan'ara, when the fade will share our tale, and it will say that I had always loved you. But, today, is when I show you, Solas. If you will let me."

For a few moments he had simply held her, his forehead pressed against hers as she had guided her fingertips delicately along the nape of his neck. In that gray half-dark, they would have appeared to any passerby as merely an intimate silhouette, but somewhere on another plane of existence they had been teetering at the edge of a large precipice.

"Show me..."

Within his voice there had been a strong sense of conviction; a coming to terms. Whatever the final cost, it had appeared he had made a choice to allow himself, her. And there were always going to be costs.

Rubbing the tip of her nose affectionately against the bridge of his, she had moved to kiss him, his hands lifting to ravel within her hair. And as his lips had played softly against her own, she had shifted herself more firmly against him, his teeth moving to graze her chin as he had guided himself fully inside of her.

"Fenedhis lasa..."

Inhaling sharply, she had dug her nails into the back of his shoulders, her head tilting back as his mouth had played gently along the delicate swell of her small breasts. And as their bodies had mingled, merged, and entwined, she had clung against the welcomed press of him; his scent, the rhythm of him, all of it met by the soft wanting curves of her body.

In the surrounding silence, there had been only their labored breathing and the undulation of water, her slight elvhen form writhing against his as she had let go of all her restraints upon the anchor. It had been a slow deep seduction, and the intensity of it had flushed her skin and called out to the lost, ancient, and forgotten magic; it's caress almost serpentine alongside their auras as it had ignited them and set them both ablaze in a dim green light.

Together they had formed a single entity, glowing as though consumed entirely by veilfire, the loose ephemeral tendrils of their combined energies listing and veering around them as chain lightening and wind had formed within the confines of the cave. And as their bodies had hummed and tightened at the very edge of release, their powers had built beside them, dancing and growing until they had become like the eye in the center of a small tempest.

"You seek to end us both..."

It had been a thought, warm and teasing; his words as clear as if she had spoken them, herself. The thread that had connected them through the veil, through their shared magics within the anchor, had become heightened by their physical connection; and within it, she had suddenly been able to feel what it had been like for him to be inside of her. She had been able to see how her eyes had reflected, green and bright, as their magics had danced along the water. How her auburn hair, long and wild, had risen with the electricity that had licked at the stone around them. She had seen it and she had felt it. He had thought her beautiful, and he had needed her.

But, there had been something else. Something hidden just beneath. Something that he had been trying to keep from her. A single name that had flashed, there but for a moment and then gone, again. She had sensed only that it had become a symbol to him. A symbol for the pain and the anguish and the self inflicted loneliness. It had been the name on his lips when he had sentenced himself to solitude, and it had been the reason he had forbidden himself to want her.

Something had happened to her, and he had blamed himself. But, who was she? Who was, Ceporah?


End file.
